It’s Not For Everyone, But Here’s How to Help Workers Who WANT to be a Manager

HERE MY TAKE: I’m not the biggest fan of CEOs, and that’s probably because a lot of them make too much money for too little leadership. Yes, there are a number of good ones out there, and Ryan Clark makes a great case for why we need to be growing more of them before the problem in doing that gets too far out of hand.

But here’s another view from someone — that would be me — who has been a manager for a long time. It’s this: there has been very little appreciation for being a good manager for as long as I have been a manager.

I wrote about this in an article I just republished here a few weeks ago titled The FIVE Big Things I’ve Learned About Becoming a Better Manager. If you’re serious about building better managers, I know you’ll find some helpful advice.

There’s also good lessons to be learned from something I published here back in May 2023 titled Are you an overbearing manager if you identify with The Devil Wears Prada?

But one of the very best insights was given to me by COO Dan Shapero of LinkedIn when I interviewed him back in January 2019 when he was the company’s Vice President for Talent Solutions, Careers, & Learning. His focus was on leadership, but in my book, managing and leadership are just two sides of the same coin. Here’s what he said:

“The thing I learned is that the elements of a great leader are, in a lot of ways, the same elements of a great person. Some people have this idea that leaders act a certain way and have a certain bravado about them. I actually think the truth is far from that, and that the people others want to follow are those who are true to themselves, have authenticity in their relationships, and are great people.”

If you build better managers, you’ll have a jump on building better employees — and that’s why companies need to work on ways to make becoming a manager a desired career path again.

ANOTHER VIEW: ChiefExecutive.net says that if an executive doesn’t demonstrate grace in their management style, odds are that division and polarization will perpetuate in their culture, as they argue in The Unexpected Character Trait Every Leader Needs Now.

One more thing …

Finally, an employee benefit for the 21st Century

FOR ANYONE WHO HAS BEEN in the workplace for a while, you probably know that employee benefits don’t change all that much.

There are always changes in the costs for what gets covered, but it’s always for the same things — medical, dental, vision, paid time off, various types of insurance (life, disability), reimbursement for tuition and child care, etc.

Pet insurance started to come around as an optional add on about 25 years ago, but other than that, there’s not much new on the benefits front. Indeed has a great list of benefits, but it is mostly what I listed above.

So imagine my surprise when Chief Executive touted a benefit I haven’t seen offered before in Why Legal Plans Are Becoming An Increasingly Sought-After Benefit.

This raises a question: Why now?

As the story notes:

“From protecting our personal interests to navigating major life milestones, like getting married or buying a home, legal matters are an inevitable part of our lives. In fact, MetLife Legal Plans’ Legal Access Study found more than two-thirds of today’s employees (67 percent) have experienced a legal situation in the past five years. So, it’s not surprising that employee interest for legal plans has more than doubled since pre-pandemic (34 percent in 2023 vs. 16 percent in 2019).

As the legal landscape evolves and workplace expectations change, it’s clear that employers have a role to play in supporting employees with what they experience both in and outside of work.”

Common misconceptions about legal coverage

THAT ALL MAKES SENSE but they add this caveat:

“Despite growing employee interest in legal plans, only a third (33 percent) of employers offer it and even fewer employees (20 percent) own it. Insights like these demonstrate that it’s not enough for employers to simply offer this benefit; they must also consider how to increase understanding of this resource to ensure employees feel empowered to use it to their advantage.”

It’s a great point, because a benefit like legal help really needs to come with some insight into just how employees can use it. Yes, it’s nice to say you offer legal benefits but helping employees understand how and when they might use it is critical to it being something useful.

In fact, one of the most interesting (and useful) insights is a list of five common misconceptions employees hold “about group legal plans, including what services they cover and how much they cost.” They include:

1. You must pay extra to get actual representation from an attorney;
2. Legal services are capped at a specific monetary value;
3. Serious criminal matters are not covered;
4. A person can only use the legal service for one issue at a time; and,
5. Legal services only give you access to documents and templates online.

If there’s a surprise here, it is that companies didn’t start offering this sooner, especially since America has gotten increasingly legalistic in so many things that we deal with in life.

There are also some benefits to the organization from offering legal services as a benefit. The Chief Executive story adds that “employees with a legal plan are more likely to be working for their organization in 12 months’ time (82 percent vs. 72 percent).”

You can complain about the ever more legalistic issues that pop up in 21st Century America, but clearly, offering legal services as an employee benefit is something that forward-thinking companies need to think about adding to their benefits mix.

As much as I like animals, it’s probably more useful than Pet Insurance.